


and the flowers bloomed for you (choking me from within)

by spinninglilies



Category: Helix Waltz (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Hanahaki Disease
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-02 23:40:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24405184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spinninglilies/pseuds/spinninglilies
Summary: Barris sits on his office chair, choking up a single withered daffodil. The meaning is clear as day : rejected love, unrequitedin which Barris loves Magda and Magda loves Barris, but neither will admit and the words take root within their bodies.
Relationships: Magda Ellenstein/Barris Sakan
Comments: 7
Kudos: 22





	and the flowers bloomed for you (choking me from within)

**Author's Note:**

> henlo i just learnt about hanahaki disease and i'm inspired. this is part 1/? for now. much thanks to jay for educating me :)

Barris tries not to watch her dance, but his eyes are drawn to her. The soft whirl of silk skimming over marble tiles, the ethereal waltz music, the soft murmur of polite conversation. Everything is amplified in his ears, and his eyes narrow on the hand on her waist, in all of its presumptuous glory. He turns away, tries to focus on the chattering of the young lady at his side, but each step she takes echoes within his being.

_(it is yellow hyacinths and marigolds that night - the flower petals bloodied and scattered, blooming from his lips)_

-

Magda does not dare hope too much. She knows better, knows that love is a girlish dream to be fondly remembered, but not cherished. She hides her devotion _(can it really be called that? if she was so-devoted, why is she willing to throw it away, to swallow the words and bury them within her)_ and gazes at him with fond affection as they stroll in the park. 

_(alone in her room, she coughs up acacia blossoms and pink camellias, and holds them as she traces down the meanings in flower tomes from the library)_

_-_

“Marriage.”

The errant Duke Sakan has never been one of the considerate sort - too consumed with his schemes and sojourns across the world, he’d fled the constraints of Finsel society as soon as his brother had grown capable to manage the household in his stead. 

Every now and then, though, he found it necessary to return to Finsel and play the part of patriarch, preaching the benefits of matrimonial harmony to his younger brother. Evidently, today is one of these times.

Barris stares at his brother with dull eyes. It’s a speech he’s heard a hundred times before, and one that he will hear a hundred times more. He’d put off courtship and romance in favour of studies, and then work, and at this point he had given up all pretensions of pursuing wedded bliss.

_(he had given up on romance because it did not interest him, not because Magda Ellenstein had bewitched him with her blue, blue eyes. Not because he had freely given her his heart, and never once thought of trying to claim hers as his own)_

And now as his brother monologued on about the marital happiness, Barris feels a migraine building at the back of his head, and the same uncomfortable feeling that’s been plaguing him grow stronger. _(It’s as if something had taken root in his lungs, blossoming in sharp bursts, stifling his breath and choking the air out of him.)_ He closes his eyes and furrows his brows, disregarding his brother in a way he can do with no one else …

“… Naturally, Miss Ellenstein would agree and-“ and his eyes fly open suddenly as the weight of his brother’s latest proposal hits him. Barris panics, uncharacteristic of his nature, and he _stutters_ , something he has not done since boyhood.

“B-b-but, she would not.” A thousand reasons why she would not, why she could not fly through his head, and he struggles to find the words to phrase his refusal. Langwon cuts him off, looking at him with sudden seriousness.

“Do you really think that?”

_(Barris sits on his office chair, choking up a single withered daffodil. The meaning is clear as day : rejected love, unrequited)_

-

Magda has cultivated a strong, almost instinctive understanding of the minds of Finsel’s elite. Without a second thought, she knows what to say, how to reply, the exact phrasing that causes her favour in their eyes to raise.

So when Barris - _it is not impolite to call an unrelated male of higher status by name, if said male has already given you permission to do so. It is_ _not_ _an intimate gesture, she reminds herself, just kind, for he is always, always kind)_ \- when Barris asks her the question, something about marriage of aristocrats being determined by parents, she replies with her usual blithe charm, that she would bear it.

It is not an untrue statement, if a bit exaggerated. Mother would never force her into an unhappy match, not while she had so many ready options. None of her replies to these probing questions are ever quite true, nor are they ever lies. They teeter on the fine line between, and she keeps her own opinions buried deep within. 

And while the statement may not have been her whole truth, it is certainly the reply Barris would like, she believes. _(she knows. Magda would never admit that she has carved his opinions and preferences into her head, if unintentionally. It is not done to chase after a man, but to appeal to him is no crime)_

His reaction belies her expectations. It’s fleeting, that panicked expression, the swiftly furrowed brows. If he had not been so well-mannered, he might have stumbled backwards, away from her. Instead, Barris inhales sharply, before his face resumes the same look of polite interest that it had before, albeit with less warmth than before.

For the rest of the ball, he is distracted, and Magda wants to curse herself for saying the wrong thing. She had never harboured … ambitions, desires, whatever the ladies were calling their husband-scheming these days, towards him. Her mother may have, appraising him whenever he escorted her to a ball with a keen eye, but Magda had never presumed to try such a thing.

Barris Sakan’s bachelorhood was as stable as the grass was green and the sky was blue. Magda did not think she, this immature girl of strange origin, could qualify to stand by his side. So instead she prepared herself to remain as friends, trained herself to look at him with affection and not besotted cow-eyes. Created a small space for herself within his life, and prepared herself to be satisfied to that _(pretended to herself as though the words she dare not say did not take root within her being)._

Later that evening, her mother informs her, softly, firmly, that she and Barris are engaged. It is an agreement between families, their sponsor approves, and although Magda has the option to refuse, she doesn’t. _(would you? with your love so close within reach?)_

It hits her that night, that Barris may have known, may have been probing her intentions with that pointed question. And she had told him to remain in the engagement, to abide by the path that was set. To bear his partner as it was his duty. _(even if he did not love that partner … did not love her)._

_(yellow chrysanthemums and purple hyacinths greet the chambermaid the next day, but the servants have long learned to ignore the flowers that appeared in Magda’s rooms.)_

**Author's Note:**

> *pretends not to see my other unfinished major character death fic* im back !! school and work kinda kicked me in the ass for several months but inspiration striketh. not making any scheduled updates bc im really quite busy, so we'll see how this goes.


End file.
